


Lemon Tree

by deepandlovelydark



Series: Second Chances [6]
Category: MacGyver (TV 1985)
Genre: 1970s, Alternate Universe - Coffee Shops & Cafés, Prison, Small Towns, Young Love, new journalism, oil crisis, philosophical conundrums
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-16
Updated: 2017-12-16
Packaged: 2019-02-15 07:32:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 2,725
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13026231
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/deepandlovelydark/pseuds/deepandlovelydark
Summary: (From Mike Forrester’s interview notes)“What does the prison mean to this small Minnesota town?”Trade. Money. The sound of a whistle when a prisoner escapes. A special section in the cemetery for inmates who had no home.“This is our bread and butter,” one resident remarks. "If we didn’t have it, Mission City would be rather a bleak place.”





	1. Ellen

He kisses her without prompting, and never complains when her meat jello goes wrong. But going out into the cold every morning, while she drowses in a warm bed? No surer sign of love than that. 

(She isn’t Ellen; that name is his mother’s, always. She can’t be MacGyver, though her husband goes by Mac these days to forestall confusion. Between the two of them she’s blotted out, and shelters behind her namelessness with pleasure.)

The coffee shop had always been a haven for her in high school, a comforting place of sweet tastes and companionship. Now it’s the home she always craved; the mother she never had; and a husband with endless love in his heart. 

She rises in plenty of time for the breakfast rush, smiling at every familiar customer. Coffee, milk, sugar. Karen Carpenter’s soft soothing voice on their record player. Making change, running out of muffins. Persuading people to take cookies instead. 

And then, just as the shop’s emptied and she’s taking a breather, the door chimes and her husband steps over the threshold. 

“Oh, you’re home! I thought you’d be hours yet, getting gas for the car.”

“So did I. But Jim Larsen remembered that time I fixed his snowmobile for free, and he let me have a few gallons on the sly…so I’m back early.” He sweeps her up, kisses her. “And my lovely, clever wife can get on with planning that mural she’s going to paint. Have you decided what the design’s going to be yet?”

“I think Mission City itself. In winter time, with a blanket of snow on the ground, and smoke coming from the chimneys. Maybe a meat raffle going on at the church…everything we love about home so much.”

Time was when she couldn’t have said a thing like that, without seeing a little quiet regret in Mac’s eyes; but there’s none of that now. He’s content, just like her.

“Sounds wonderful,” he whispers, and starts kissing her in earnest. So rude, and flamboyant, and delightful.

Of course, that’s just when Mike Forrester has to walk through their door…

**************

Mike’s return means that they have their foursome back. She treats everyone to steak dinners that night, with off-handed generosity. 

(Threesome. It was the three would-be adventurers for a long time, before Mac invited her into the group; Ellen’s never quite felt she belonged.)

“You wouldn’t believe what you’re missing out there,” Mike says, digging into her food with gusto. “Glam and danger, and sometimes you get to make the world a better place.” She winks at Mac. “To say nothing of all the pretty girls.”

“I’m a happily married man!” 

“And I’m trying to be responsible these days,” Jack chimes in. “Planes are expensive. I can’t be wasting all my money on good-looking broads.”

“Not even in your thirties yet, and you’re already a couple of old fogies,” Mike says, with pity in her voice. 

Jack laughs. Mac’s face is unreadable, at first; but he turns his wedding ring round and round on his finger, and smiles. “If it’s so good out there, what are you doing back here?”

“Freelancing,” Mike explains. “My editor says he’ll start me on headliners, if I can deliver a real eye-opener of a story- and I’ve had one just waiting in my back pocket. A cute little Minnesota town, built to cater for a federal correctional institute-”

“Oh, that’s not fair,” Ellen pipes up (to her own surprise). “The city was here long before that.”

“Town at best,” Mike says, rolling her eyes. “I’ve seen cities that make Minneapolis look like a ghost town, this is nothing by comparison. But okay, so Mission City used to be this independent frontier beholden to nobody. It sure isn’t now- just look at Mac here. Who’s your best customer?”

“The prison,” Mac agrees. “I drive out with the coffee urns every morning, pick up the empties every afternoon- they could make it themselves, but my mother’s done it for them so long they probably don’t even have a percolator.”

“There you go. Crazy little contrast, isn’t it? Perfect material for a nice piece of Tom Wolfe new journalism.” 

“You’re not making it sound nice,” Ellen says. “Not that we’re ashamed of it, but…”

“We’re a little ashamed,” Jack says, emptying his wine glass. “The crud at the heart of our all-American town, the raw meat that keeps blood and less salubrious liquids pumping through our collective guts.”

“I’m cutting you off,” Mac tells him, plunking the bottle out of reach. “When you start waxing poetic, I know you’ve had too much.”

“Me, waxing poetic? And who is it who bought an anthology of the stuff at the bookshop last week?”

“I was flipping through it and saw a poem called ‘Notes from a Letter to Ellen’,“ Mac says. “Of course I had to buy it after that.”

“And I’ve been reading it to him, at nights.”

“You two are kinda cute together,” Mike admits. “Maybe you’re not such a bad match as I’d figured.”

She switches topics then, to the glories of Southern California, and the time she stole a camel in Kuwait, and whether Mac can smuggle her into the prison without anyone noticing. 

But Ellen finds herself feeling curiously validated. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The story summary text is not, in fact, mine: I have shamelessly nicked it from the [Pine County History](http://pinecountyhistory.blogspot.com/2011/09/) blog.
> 
> I'd throughly recommend it for anyone interested in eastern Minnesota, although you might want to finish the story first. 
> 
> Rod McKuen's "Notes from a Letter to Ellen" is also real.


	2. Allison

_Three months on._

“Don’t feel bad about it,” her brother always tells Allison, when she comes home for visits. “If it was only going to be one of us at college, I’m glad it was you. And one of these days- maybe when I’ve invented something really spectacular and we’re rich, Ellen can have her art school and I can try for my chemistry degree…”

Knowing that she’d never have met Michael otherwise does help, in a half-guilty way; she can’t imagine life without him, or her two darling babies. 

And yet, and yet…

“I wonder if you’d be getting more out of my life than I am,” Allison says (the quiet mid-afternoon lull; she's helping little Christopher knock over and rebuild endless block towers). “A degree, and no end of anti-nuke rallies, and nonviolence marches are all very well, but I still wonder.”

“He’s hardly likely to do any of that in Mission City, thank goodness,” Ellen observes. “What’s there to protest?”

“The prison, maybe?” Mac says, bouncing baby Becky on his knee. “I wonder how Mike’s piece turned out. Never heard anything about that.”

“Write her and ask?” Allison suggests. “What was her last forwarding address?”

“She didn’t leave one this time,” Mac says. “To be honest, I’ve been sort of worrying about her.” He frowns for a moment, until Becky’s happy burbling distracts him. 

“Maybe she’s still in prison,” Ellen laughs. “For her research.”

“I don’t like the sound of this,” Allison murmurs. “Running up against the Establishment can be a dicey proposition.” 

“But she’s all right if she doesn’t do anything wrong, right?” Mac points out. 

“Which may be quite an assumption, if she’s the danger-happy Mike Forrester I remember…”

“She reshingled the roof for me before she left, just to rub it in about not being afraid of heights. Or hammers.”

“So, that's a yes.”

*************

“Is he all right? I mean, really,” she asks her mother later. 

“I think so- he’s very determined to make sure I never work too hard. Of course, sometimes I get around him anyway.”

Allison smiles; the family work ethic is something between a joke and an addiction (except for Mac, funnily enough, who’s always fluctuating between frenzied activity and sofa-lazing). “Not too often, I hope.”

“Not too often. And Ellen helps as well- she’s such a good sport, it’s wonderful to see her gaining self-confidence. He couldn’t have married a sweeter girl. Sometimes we gang up on him and insist that he enjoy himself in the workshop for a few hours.”

“One of these days, he’ll blow up the world with that chemistry set of his.”

“Or save it,” her mother rebukes her. 

*************

“Michael? So glad to hear from you, honey.”

“Uh-huh. Yes, Chris is going through a stage of being fascinated with shoes. Keeps drawing pictures…of course, they are rather easier to see, at his height. And Becky’s fine, everyone’s doing their best to spoil her rotten. I’ll have a buckyball for a daughter by the time we get back to Seattle- oh, don’t even try going serious on me, you laughed!”

“Mmm hmm. All my love back to the commune. And tell Karen that her brownies are in the freezer…” 

“One more thing. Can someone get in touch with Alexander? Only Mac says that Mike Forrester’s vanished into thin air, and if anyone’s tapped into the media grapevine, you know it’d be Alexander.”

“Thanks, love. Be home soon, I miss you.”

*************

“Thinking about children yet?”

“Believe me, we’ve tried often enough.” A wry smile: Ellen always did call a spade a spade, Allison recalls. “But it’s just not happening.”

“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have asked.”

“It’s all right,” Ellen says warmly. “At least we have each other. That’s enough.”

But it rather spoils the joke for her later on, when Mac’s kidding her about the children. 

“I mean, two of ‘em already? Sure you don’t want to let Ellen and I have this one for a keepsake?”

For a moment, as she watches her brother cuddling Becky to his heart, Allison’s almost tempted to say yes. 


	3. Mac

When Allison calls to confirm that no one’s heard of Mike in months, Mac finds himself going to work on the problem with weird self-confidence. 

He doesn’t say anything to Sergeant Olson, just asks if he can have a look at the arrest records to match up some suspected thefts from the shop. There’s her name down, for possession and intent to distribute, and malicious destruction of property (property being the back records on juvenile delinquents, he’s amused to see). Mission City has an arrangement with the FCI, to hold anyone charged with a felony while they’re awaiting trial…so she made it into the prison, at least. 

He doesn’t go anywhere near the place for a few days, enlisting his mother to take over the coffee deliveries. (It’s a good way of letting her work off some energy, and Ellen loves her sleep.)

He does ask both of them if he’s doing the right thing. 

“Don’t, honey,” Ellen implores. “We’re so happy- I couldn’t bear it, if anything went wrong.” 

“I think you’re old enough to make your own decisions,” his mother says. “And your own mistakes.”

Well. A boy should always listen to his mother. 

*************

It’s kinda disappointingly easy to smuggle himself in. Everyone’s always so happily distracted by the coffee- and even if someone does notice, the guards are used to seeing him ‘round the place. Mac has no trouble getting to the laundry for a guard uniform. 

Disguise next. Quite a bit of Ellen’s makeup, to give him a sunless pallor. An application of cotton wool to change his jawline, like Jack had shown him once for a Halloween party; and what’s more painful but convincing than either, cropping his hair to a neat crewcut. The whole town knows he’s worn the same long mop for years. Nobody’s ever going to recognise him like this, even if they see him; and with luck, they won’t. 

Then it’s just a matter of curling up under a pile of scratchy blankets. He goes to sleep, trusting instinct to wake him if anything should happen. It doesn’t. 

Simplicity itself at nightfall, to calmly help himself to a sandwich and start rifling through the prisoner records- well, at least it’s simple for someone who stole a peek at the guard schedule. No, there’s more to it than that; he’s keenly alert, awake in a way he’s never been before. Nobody ever mentioned that fear was going to feel this good. Even better than hockey.

Michelle Forrester. He pulls the file out, flips through it as fast as calf-skin gloves will allow. Brought in on such and such a date, incited a riot to strike for better living conditions (that sounds like Mike, all right), punished with solitary confinement…

His heart starts thumping at the details. Weeks kept alone in a tiny cell, hardly any light or food- how could all this be happening in America? So close to Mission City’s hospitable friendliness?

(“Haven’t you read any of my letters?” he can all but hear Allison saying. “What do you think I’ve been protesting? The Establishment that lets this sort of thing happen!”)

Mac flips back. Here’s her cell number. He has to find her. 

It isn’t the right decision, but he can’t do anything else. 

************

There are people screaming. 

There are a great many people screaming, and he wants to save all of them but he’s only got enough time to cut open this one door with his oxy-gasoline torch (expensive, but small and discreet).

“Mike,” Mac whispers as he enters. “Mike, are you okay?”

There’s a body lying, not on the bed but under it. He doesn’t think it’s asleep. 

“It’s me. Mac- MacGyver. Please tell me you’re okay.”

He pulls the door to and gets down on his knees, holding a light to her face. Her eyes follow the movement only sluggishly, with catatonic dullness. 

“I gotta get you out of here,” he mutters. 

Hard work, getting her upright and to the cell door, but he manages it- whereupon she sobs and dives straight back in. Huddling in the corner, trying to make herself as small as possible. 

“Too much space out there,” Mike whispers. “Too much space.”

“Please! I gotta help you!”

For a moment, there’s a flicker of intelligence in her eyes. She crawls across the floor to the bed again, taps on it.

“What? Am I looking for something?”

Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. 

Here: thin sheets of paper, rolled up inside the bed leg. Mike keeps tapping while he reads them, with a sickening monotony. The proposed article of her prison experiences, her loopy flowing hand narrowing to tightness as she ran out of paper and sanity. A reporter’s meticulous chronicle of her own disintegration. 

The last note: “I can’t seem to remember sky, now. Or why I wanted it.”

He tries one last time to drag her out of the cell, but she whimpers and won’t come. All he can do is tuck her last article safely in his pocket. 

Mike doesn’t even seem to notice, when he leaves. 


	4. Ellen

“You did it for love, didn’t you?” 

Mike Forrester’s last article has caused a firestorm of controversy. National headlines, people fascinated and outraged and titillated, Mission City undergoing a nine days humiliation. 

For once, the Establishment’s listening (is it only as a distraction, from the the ever-more-obvious Beltway corruption?) Studies on solitary confinement, and a Congressional panel, and a pardon for Mike (what's left of her given up to her grieving parents, who move quickly and don't leave word). In six months, the FCI will close. Only the auxiliary establishment for local criminals to be kept up. 

_You’ve ripped the heart out of this town. During the worst recession in years, we’re about to be thrown into that turmoil with no defense, but- it was because you loved Mike, wasn’t it?_

Insane of him to do it, but she’ll always forgive him too much love. Just the same way she can forgive him Jack Dalton. 

“You sent the article to her editor, because you hated what they’d done to her.”

“I’d have done it whether I knew Mike or not,” Mac returns. “Because it was the right thing to do.”

“We’ll lose the coffee order. And Mission City’s never going to recover, not in a hundred years.”

“We let this happen. Collectively. Good riddance.”

And her world simply falls apart. Because she’d only love him more, for love; but this isn’t love. This is cold, cruel justice, the kind that sweeps away without caring that it tears a community apart. Not kind. Not nice. Her own sweetheart Mac, when push comes to shove, turns out to be someone she never knew at all. 

It takes a long time for her to gather her courage. It takes years, and the death of his sweet mother, and the forcing of endless petty quarrels, and a bankruptcy, before she can bring herself to do it. 

But this is the night Ellen MacGyver decides to leave. 


End file.
